On heavy rotation in my aural world these days is Beck‘s new album, Sea Change. Exceptional, and highly recommended.
Silent Running & Solaris
Images from the just-released film, Solaris remind me of Silent Running, one of the first sci-fi movies I ever saw. I must have been around 10 years old, and was enthralled despite the fact that it’s a fairly boring movie.
Judging from reviews for Solaris, the two movies sound similar in their spare aesthetic. Neither of these movies are from the Star Wars or Starship Troopers branch of science fiction.
Silent Running, for those who don’t remember this gem from the 70s, starred Bruce Dern as a botanist aboard an enormous spaceship filled with plants. The ship, one of series a botanical “Noah’s Arks,” contains remnants of the last surviving forest from Earth. Conflict among the small crew leaves Dern the only human aboard.
To say that not much happens during the movie is being generous. But something about it stuck in my head and has never left. As a child, being lost in space with robot friends and lush gardens seemed a lot more romantic than it does today. These days, I know I’d get lonely fairly quickly. I’d still want to go for the ride, but couldn’t I bring some friends? Ones that won’t go insane, preferably.
This Is Not Progress
Adam Greenfield of v-2.org offers his observations on the state of Japanese design and aesthetic:
The Japan That Should Say No
Where Japanese culture used to be expert at finding the one element in a situation that bore psychological meaning, at manipulating the tension between what is made explicit and what is left unsaid, it now contents itself with wallowing in the banal.
This is as true of technology (and associated domains like information design) as it is of, say, J-pop. As recently as the 1960s, Japan produced as a matter of course train schedules, tourist maps, and newspaper weather reports so carefully devised that master information designer Edward Tufte chose them as particularly exquisite examples of the use of line and color to carry data.
Similarly, up until the 1980s, Japanese technology led the world in simplification, miniaturization – refinement. More recently, manufacturers seem engaged in a race to bombard the user with the most extraneous features. It’s trumpeted as innovative when the new model keitai comes with interchangeable faceplates.
Like I say: banal.
During my brief time in Japan, I haven’t seen a lot to dispute his observations. Take my mobile phone, for example…
Short Films
Hollywood movies generally show up in Japan three to six months after they are released in the States. And then they are shown at expensive theaters where your ticket doesn’t even guarantee you a seat. If you happen to live, as I do, in a slightly sleepy city in the mountains, that expensive ticket doesn’t even get you a decent venue. All this helps explain why I’ve only seen one film in a theater in the six months I’ve been here.
If I can’t see the movies, though, I’m not going to miss the trailers. Every once in a while, I’ll spend a good chunk of time on Apple’s “Trailers” site, perusing the movies I won’t be seeing at a theatre near me soon.
I watched a batch of trailers last night, and…
I hate it that I’ll be missing Almodovar’s new movie, Talk to Her. Even if it’s released here in Japan during my stay, the subtitles will be in Japanese rather than in English.
There’s an art to making a good trailer, though the talentless advertising hacks in charge usually screw it up. Case in point: The Hours. Watch this trailer and tell me that, towards the end, it doesn’t look like it’s going to be one of those bad Michael Douglas suspense movies. Please, please, please let the movie be better than this trailer makes it out to be.
Ben Affleck as Daredevil? They’ll have to change the tag line from “The man without fear” to “The man without charisma.” Click below to see a real superhero.
Full-Body Scans
A Kyoto company offered full-body scans at the Tokyo Game Show recently. This site collects the results.
I want one. Looks well worth the approximately US $18.
Scroll all the way through; there are some great scans at the end, including one of a woman who doesn’t need a push-up bra.
Ebisuko Fireworks
There was a huge fireworks display last night in Nagano. It lasted for two hours. Two hours!
This is something of an anomaly in Japan, where most fireworks displays are held in the summer or autumn. This annual, late-November display has developed into something of a showcase for fireworks artisans, allowing them to preview next season’s displays and new techniques.
Crowds of people huddled in the cold near the large river that runs through Nagano, watching the fireworks and enjoying food and warm sake provided by the scores of vendors.
Comic Book Geek
When I posted the entry earlier this week on news articles touting the respectability of comic books, I must have been brain dead to forget my personal involvement in just such an endeavor.
In 1987, at the tender age of 18, I had my first-ever published article. It was a piece on comic book censorship, and it ran in the local daily in Kenai, Alaska, along with an article called “The Evolution of Comic Books.” I was the featured “expert” in the “Evolution” article, which was accompanied by a picture that to this day I’m embarrassed to see.
Re-reading my article, I’m pleasantly surprised at the quality (and by this I mean it doesn’t suck). Was I really only 18? Then I re-read the article in which I’m interviewed and come across this:
“Superman has been pretty much redone. He not as powerful, no romance with Lois… He’s more of a yuppie than he used to be,” Gerhard said.
Groan… And this proved comics were becoming more respectable? Well, it was the 80s and I was just a boy.
For the amusement of all, I’m posting both articles here.
Don’t Make Us Make More Crappy Movies
As if his recent movies weren’t proof enough, George Lucas offers the following, showing he needs emergency remedial education in both metaphors and logic:
Star Wars Creator Calls for Attack on Piracy
“I am begging for co-operation. There are unintended consequences of piracy. If piracy is not stopped, the rainforest of the entertainment business ecosystem will collapse. I am pleading for the creative people in this industry,” he said.
Mr. Lucas warned that piracy threatened to reduce the movie industry’s revenues, forcing film corporations to concentrate on blockbusters, rather than also investing in smaller art movies.
Rainforest? Ecosystem? Give me a break.
And correct me if I’m wrong, but wasn’t the film industry already concentrating on blockbusters? And isn’t that due more to the success of blockbusters created by Lucas and Steven Spielberg (who lends his voice to Lucas’ plea) rather than to piracy? This is the film industry holding a gun to the head of movies they already don’t like to make and telling viewers, “Don’t make me shoot her.”
Fall Pics
I’ve posted some new photos, from a bike ride and hike I did last Sunday. They show some of the nice fall colors we have now in Nagano.
Stop Trying So Hard
I can’t count the number of times over the years I’ve read news articles along the lines of, “Guess what! Comic books are serious art!” Here’s another one.
Inevitably, these articles always present a laundry list of serious issues ripped from the headlines of the day that are dealt with in current comic books. Inevitably, reading this list always makes me think, god that sounds boring.
In my mind, comics—like so many other forms of art—are at their worst when they consciously try to be serious and earnest. The magic of comics has always been found in unexpected places and in surprising forms. Alcoholism, sexual-identity crises, drug addiction, abusive childhood, terrorism? Including these issues within stories is not a bad thing, per say. But it shouldn’t be the main focus.
There are exceptions, of course. The astonishing Maus always tops that list. But when you try to mix, say, Green Lantern and the serious issues of the day, the effect comes off as kind of sad and comical, or a lot like a lecture from Tipper Gore.
I wish the comic book world would stop craving mainstream legitimacy and go right on creating worlds of wonder for those who know where to look.